Catherine 'Cat' Battle was a special lady

In all my years of covering high
school athletics, which goes way back to 1977, there's a handful of athletes I
wrote about whom I consider to be good friends.

There's only one who I consider to
be one of my best friends _ Gary Battle.

A standout basketball player at
Colonia and at the University of New Haven, I formed a bond with Gary when he
was a senior in high school and I drove him to East

Gary Battle and his mom.

Brunswick High School for a
Player of the Year photo shoot.

This was 1987, Gary was 18, I was 28.
That bond grew ever since that day

I don't know if I met his mother
that day, but I got to know her when Gary was in high school.

She was special then and she was
special to the day she passed on Friday, April 19 at the age of 74 after a long
bout with lung cancer.

Catherine 'Cat' Battle, who lived in
Metuchen the past 15 years, loved her
family more than anything in the world.

A single mom after her husband passed away in
1999, she worked two jobs a day for
many years to provide for her four children. She was a popular maintenance worker
at the Indiana Street School in Iselin by day, while working at J.C. Penney at night.

She was the one who opened up the
doors for Gary when he began the popular Battlebasketball clinics, which
spurned into a very successful AAU team base.

'Cat' was always upbeat, always had
a smile and always welcomed me into her life with open arms. Despite working
hours on end every day for years, Gary said she never complained about being
tired, she never complained about her illness, she just cared about the well
being of her family.

The last time I spoke to 'Cat' was
on May 20, 2011 when Gary married former Metuchen hoop standout Tanya Wood. We
talked for over an hour.

Ill at the time, Mrs. Battle was all
smiles and so proud of her son, who went on to have a very successful life after
basketball. I am so glad I had that quality time to spend with her that
evening. I will always remember and cherish it.

After her passing, Gary attended a
national AAU basketball tournament in Virginia in which his son Tyus was playing
in. Tyus is a standout player at Gill St. Bernards, who has already been
offered close to 20 Division I scholarships as a freshman.

With 20 seconds left in double
overtime of the quarterfinal game, Tyus forced a five-second violation. On the
offensive end, he made two foul shots
with no time left on the clock to win the game for Team Final. After making the shots, he just
looked to the skies. He knows who gave him the inspiration to make those foul shots.